last few days

[cellio]

My synagogue has each grade-school class run one service a year. This has been frustrating for me for a variety of reasons, but this year they made a change. Fourth and fifth grades are now having their services at the monthly "family" Shabbat service, rather than the primary congregational service, and all classes are being split into two services. (Some classes have 50+ kids, and that was just too crazy.)

Last night was the first of these modified services, and it went very well. It was much less chaotic, the kids got to do more, and it was more of a service than a pageant for the parents. And the younger grades, which are more problematic, are doing their services in a more supportive (for them) and less annoying (for the rest of us) environment. It's a win all around, I think.

When there's a bar or bat mitzvah (which is almost every week), that person participates a bit in the Friday service (kiddush and v'shamru). The girl who was bat mitzvah this Shabbat is really good -- good Hebrew pronunciation, good singing voice, and, most importantly, good kavanah. She seemed to really connect with the words she was saying; she was leading, not just performing. At the oneg I told her how impressed I am and that I hope she'll continue to be involved -- confirmation, youth group, etc.

This morning's service went well. For the second week in a row I successfully wound the torah scroll to the right point before the service; I'll learn my way around yet. :-) (Usually the rabbi does it, but both times I was there first and I guess I'm sort of the quasi-gabbai or something now, so I took a crack at it.)

Three of our upcoming Torah readers specifically signed up for their own bar/bat-mitzvah portions. Two are students (so this was fairly recent). None of them have committed to doing more than the one portion, but I hope at least some of them decide to stick with it. Right now I've got five people (including myself) who are "regulars", and several people who are doing it once and then will decide. (I'm not counting the rabbi, who reads in weeks without b'nei mitzvah. I think there are four of those in the next six months.) I'd like to have about eight regulars.

On my way to services Friday I ran into someone on the street who said "hey, aren't you a cantor at [congregation]?" I said I had led services there occasionally but now they've hired a professional (who, I said, is good), and he said flattering things about my work. That was pleasant. (He doesn't belong there either and goes only occasionally, but seems to have hit several of my services purely by accident.)

I've been reading a book called The Kiruv Files, about Jewish outreach. More about that later, but one observation now: one of us, either I or the Orthodox rabbis who wrote it, has a fundamental misunderstanding of Reform Judaism. The book takes a few swipes at Reform, predicated on the assumption that "all halacha is optional for you guys" (so therefore you can change the rules to suit your whims). Um, no. That Reform does not accept the system of halacha handed down to us, wholesale, and that Reform insists on personal autonomy, does not mean that we get to ignore it all. Many Jews do, of course (and not all of them call themselves Reform), but serious Reform Jews can and do accept some halachot as binding -- just as binding as traditional Jews do. This is why I do not work on Shabbat, why I keep kosher, why I pray in certain ways, and why I do or don't do bunches of other stuff. The problem, to the outsider, is that a different Reform Jew will have a different set of binding halachot.

Thursday night's board meeting included the quarterly financial review (budget vs actuals). The reports are getting clearer, in part due to requests from me. :-) And I see that a couple of our newer board members are very concientious (and nit-picky) in reviewing these things, which makes me happy. I'm in my last year; someone else has to be as anal-retentive for me, for continuity. :-) (I'm also on the nominating committee for the next round of board members, which should be interesting. That was announced Thursday.)

Tuesday lyev and I had a small dance workshop (no one else could make it) in which we reconstructed Belfiore (15th-century Italian) from first principles. It turns out that there is one ambiguity that I hadn't remembered from the last time I looked at this (with Rosina): do the three dancers start side-by-side, like in Petit Vriens, or in a single-file line? We had assumed the former, but one of the figures is difficult that way and there are references in the text to dancers "above" and "below" others (where we are not talking about vertical displacement with respect to the floor). We only had two dancers so couldn't try a complete implementation, but I can see the single-file line working. Eventually we'll be able to give it a shot, or lyev will get the Thursday dancers to try it. And I should check our notes from Joy and Jealousy now; I didn't want to do that before because it's actually been long enough that I've forgotten and this way I could come to it without (obvious) preconceptions.

Tonight we went to a restaurant that was so dimly lit that I actually had to take the menu to the front (lobby) area so I could read it. Argh! I'm not surprised by dim light from fancy and/or pretentious restaurants, where I guess the assumption is that you don't need to see your food and candles are romantic, but -- Outback? C'mon! I guess I should be on the lookout for a flashlight small enough to carry in a pocket; I think they make such things targetted for shining a light on your door locks at night; I would imagine that's designed to be fairly small.

Comments

[spiritdancer]

I guess I should be on the lookout for a flashlight small enough to carry in a pocket; I think they make such things targetted for shining a light on your door locks at night; I would imagine that's designed to be fairly small.

MagLite makes a really small (uses 1 AAA battery) flashlight made to go on your keychain. http://www.maglite.com/product.asp?psc=1AAACELL&pt=R will take you to the specific page from the manufacturer. I've seen 'em for sale at a couple of places - your local Lowe's/Home Depot would probably be a good place to start; you might get lucky and find one at WalMart, tho' the selection there is usually limited. I think I've spotted them at Office Depot, as well.

Good luck!
_M_

[sanpaku.livejournal.com]

The book takes a few swipes at Reform, predicated on the assumption that "all halacha is optional for you guys" (so therefore you can change the rules to suit your whims).

Surely this is something you think about quite a bit, though. You certainly are the first Reform person I have ever, and I do mean ever, who does those things. My understanding was that Reform is a non-halachic system in the sense that you should only do a ritual or act if you personally feel motivated to do it. Universal, rational imperatives are binding; rituals and prohibitions are optional. Wouldn't that be accurate?

[goljerp]

The book takes a few swipes at Reform,

I think that the problem is that there are people who really are secular and not really affiliated with any movement. However, they self-identify as "Reform" for whatever reason, even though they don't know about the philosophy and history of the Reform movement. Of course, if the people who wrote the book actually bothered to talk to Rabbis at HUC (the reform Seminary, with campuses conveniently located in New York, Cincinnati, and Jerusalem) (also LA? I'm not sure) they could've been disabused of their mistakes.

[siderea]

For some reason, reading this, I was suddenly overtaken by a burning need for meat knishes with heart-stopping gravy.

I look forward to hearing your results with Bel Fiore!

I think the Outback is lit that way to give a "we're all sitting around a campfire" feeling. *sigh* Key chain LEDs are great, but if you leave them on all night by accident, they die. (Blush.)

e

[jerusha.livejournal.com]

on the lookout for a flashlight small enough to carry in a pocket; I think they make such things targetted for shining a light on your door locks at night; I would imagine that's designed to be fairly small.

The prototypical keychain LED flashlight is the Photon Micro-Light. I have an LED flashlight on my keychain that I picked up at Office Depot (or the other office supply store with Office in the name; I can never keep them straight) for under $4. My husband has a similar one that I picked up at Wal-Mart. And I just picked up an LED booklight from Sam's Club for under $3 (on sale).

I would recommend that you shop for one that either requires something beyond a simple pushbutton to turn on, or can be locked in the off position. My light, which is a simple push button, has gotten much dimmer, and I suspect that it's turning on and lighting up the inside of my pocket, thus expending battery power.

Belfiore

[vonstrassburg.livejournal.com]

I'd always assumed (well, no, it was the way I reconstructed it) that both Belfiore and Petit Vriens are done in a single-file line. So in that respect my recon of both dances differs from Rosina's. I think I hit the same problem as you in reconstructing Belfiore and so made the reduction-ad-absurdum deduction that it must be a la figlia, and so the same with Petit Vriens.

Continental divide.

I also make my riprese at the end of Petit Vriens longer than Rosina does, and the volta tunda faster, so it looks more like skip and spin than set and turn.

[aliza250.livejournal.com]

You remind me of another knowledgeable and committed Reform Jew that I know; may I pass your journal URL to her?

I used to see tiny disposable keychain flashlights at grocery store checkout lines all the time. I still have a pink one that hasn't burned out yet. (I will admit that I no longer find the idea of a disposable flashlight ecologically acceptable.) The one currently on my keychain is about the size and shape of a AAA battery, and is imprinted with an ad for whoever it was that gave them out as freebies. (Effective advertising, eh?)

Keep notes on your Torah readers - even if they don't volunteer again, you can ask them to read the same parsha again next year, since they already learned it once. After that, it's easier to sucker them into more one-off readings.

Do your readers have to do the whole parsha? At my father's shul, they have a whole slew of volunteer readers, but the minimum commitment is two aliyot. Or maybe have a Shabbat where each aliyah is read by a different first-time ba'al koreh.

[aliza250.livejournal.com]

I know that our Torah readings must sound pretty trivial to most people, as most read the entire parsha every week, but change is slow and this minyan mostly did not read torah at all until a few months ago, so I think we're doing pretty well.

And not only the readers are learning, but the whole congregation is learning. Sounds like a worthy endeavor.

When I grew up, girls did not read Torah, at all. The Bat Mitzva offered to me was to read the Haftarah on Friday night, without the blessings. I declined. I learned trope (the little thingies above and below the letters in a Torah scroll, that provide the musical notation) in 6th grade (I went to Solomon Schechter Day School in Philadelphia), but never used them. Now I've got them going through my brain as a music virus...

T'lisha k'tana-a-a-h, azla GAYresh, ger-sha-yee-ee-ee-ee-eem...

I've had aliyot a few times; the first was at a USY convention, I think. The gabbait noted in passing that it was my first aliyah ever (ta-amod, Aliza Rachel bat HaRav Shmuel M'nachem v'Brynah, l'pa'am harishona) and that was that. I guess that was my Bat Mitzva. :-) I've led services, done Yom Tov kiddush, been tenth for the minyan on Yom Kippur, led a seder... but I've never read Torah.

I think the closest Torah scroll to here is 4.5 hours travel away, so it won't be happening any time soon, either. I'm not observant, but I do miss many of the things I grew up with.